As consumer electronics continue to scale down in size, there is a growing interest in a class of radio equipment called Software Defined Radio (SDR). 

Recently, we’ve explored some of the basics of what SDR can do.  The work was done mostly using free software and low-cost equipment designed for use with desktop computers, laptops, and mobile devices.  Today, I would like to explore a useful reference on this topic: Eugene Grayver’s Implementing Software Defined Radio.

Overview

The book is split into twelve chapters, with each covering a different aspect of planning, implementing, and maintaining a practical SDR system in real applications. 

Chapters 1 through 4 and parts of Appendix A mostly define what an SDR is capable of, a few of SDRs limitations, and some important advantages they have compared to hardware-based radio systems.

Chapters 5 and 6 deal with the signal processing hardware aspect.  This is where you can find examples and case studies using general-purpose processors, digital signal processors (DSP), application-specific integrated circuits (ASIC), field-programmable gate arrays (FPGA), and systems on chips (SoC).

Chapters 7 and 8 cover real-life examples of major SDR projects produced by the government, the private sector, and industrial consortiums.  Here, there is an emphasis on standardizing SDR methods and infrastructure; which is where the industry seems to be headed in my own opinion.

Chapters 9, 10, and 11: Cover the hardware architectures, components, and toolchains This includes the radio receiver/transmitter front-end.

Key Take-Aways

Implementing Software Defined Radio should help existing SDR users bridge some of the knowledge gaps between information theory and signal processing.  Like many books on the topic, it’s probably a good idea to pair it with Shannon and Weaver’s 1948 book “The Mathematical Theory of Communication,” since it will provide some useful (but not 100% required) insight through the earlier chapters and in appendix A.

Speaking of the appendix, I do feel this section would stand fairly well on its own as a stand-alone chapter near the start of this book.  This area goes into some crucial terminology for radio and modulation, and even covers some classic radio propagation challenges such as multi-path, rain attenuation (rain fade), and so on.  But given that the book is meant to focus on software defined radio rather than radio in general, its understandable to see this presented in the appendix.

In summary, I would imagine this is best geared toward SDR users, professionals, and radio enthusiasts who have a bit of a background in radio communications in general.  For design work, the many use cases can probably help those who are still in the ideational phases of planning his or her next SDR project.

References

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